Finding the Green within the Grey

What’s Right?

Right is Liz telling Chris she loves his nose when she says goodnight to him.

Right are the pictures in my office:

There’s my young self: laying on top of my dad in a lawn chair, the grass underneath us as endless as the horizon.

Right: all the noses in these pictures that look at me as I work in my beloved office.

Right: that old boyfriend back when I was 23 who said what I wanted was for people to pay me to write all day.

Right: my husband saying we need to update the pictures in our house to match the ages of everyone in our family now.

Right: all these people behind us (who are versions of us) looking out at us from these frames all around our house.

Right: our new selves looking at pictures of our sweet old selves, existing together in these shared glances.

There’s Liz pointing out what she loves about our faces right now. There’s someone I hardly know, telling me she loves my face. Someone from a trip I took long ago.

I love your faces, people! Your faces from the photographs. Your faces right now. The future faces we can’t see yet. The faces we are making right now, hopefully with lots of love for ourselves. Love for ourselves from ourselves + love from the people around us.

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Nancy Schatz Alton

I used to ride the playground ponies — painted metal creature swings behind my childhood home — and dream of a book with my name on it: Nancy Schatz. Years later, I walked that same playground and young girl asked me my age. Maybe I was 19. Shocked, she asked if I was married. Nope, not yet, I laughed in reply.

Now I’m married and my body’s pretty close to being 50 years old. My first dream came true with one minor adjustment. The name on the cover of those books is “Nancy Schatz Alton.” I think it took writing these two holistic healthcare guides — The Healthy Back Book and The Healthy Knees Book — to believe I really am a writer. But I’ve been a writer before I could pencil the alphabet on the itchy lined paper in Kindergarten. It’s just who I am.

I wear many other definitions. I’m lucky enough to be a mom to a teenager and a tween. I’m a freelance writer, editor and writing teacher and coach, too. I’m a baker and a short-order cook, an off-key singer and car dancer. I’m a former long distance runner, an avid reader and a lover of color. I’m also a spy, because writers are spies, right?

This blog was born a few years ago when I finally got tired of denying myself the privilege of having a blog. I love sharing my words, and if these thoughts can help someone else, even better. As this blog has evolved, some of what I have written is part of a memoir manuscript entitled “But Still and Yet: Navigating the Learning Differences World with My Daughter.” That’s the tale of being and becoming a mother. No, it’s not the story of my first child’s birth and how I stepped into this new role, although there are many fine books about this very topic. This memoir is about learning to embrace the idea that life doesn’t always get to be easy for our offspring. If you aren’t a parent, the journey I take is the same journey all humans take during this lifetime. This memoir answers this question: how do we crack ourselves open to become our best possible selves?

Boom. Enjoy my blog. Say hello via a comment if you have can. And Welcome to Within The Words, Finding the Green within the Grey,.

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